POISONED DEVELOPMENT: ASSESSING CHILDHOOD LEAD EXPOSURE AS A CAUSE OF CRIME IN A BIRTH COHORT FOLLOWED THROUGH ADOLESCENCE

Criminology

Volumn 56, Issue 2, 2018, Pages 269-301

  Sampson, Robert J ^a   Winter, Alix S ^a  

^a HARVARD UNIVERSITY   (United States)

Author keywords

antisocial behavior; crime; impulsivity; lead poisoning; toxic inequality

Indexed keywords

EID: 85042194041     PISSN: 00111384     EISSN: 17459125     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1111/1745-9125.12171     Document Type: Article

References (94)

1. Achenbach, Thomas M. 1997. Manual of the Young Adult Self-Report and Young Adult Behavior Checklist. Burlington: Department of Psychiatry, University of Vermont.
2. Agnew, Robert. 2011. Dire forecast: A theoretical model of the impact of climate change on crime. Theoretical Criminology 16:21–42.
3. Aizer, Anna, and Janet Currie. 2017. Lead and juvenile delinquency: New evidence from linked birth, school, and crime records. Cambridge, MA: National Bureau of Economic Research. Working Paper 23392.
4. Albalak, Rachel, Rebecca Hart McElroy, Gary Noonan, Sharunda Buchanan, Robert L. Jones, W. Dana Flanders, and Carol Gotway-Crawford. 2003. Blood lead levels and risk factors for lead poisoning among children in a Mexican smelting community. Archives of Environmental Health 58:172–83.
5. Amato, Michael S., Sheryl Magzamen, Pamela Imm, Jeffrey A. Havlena, Henry A. Anderson, Marty S. Kanarek, and Colleen F. Moore. 2013. Early lead exposure (<3 years old) prospectively predicts fourth grade school suspension in Milwaukee, Wisconsin (USA). Environmental Research 126:60–5.
6. Angrist, Joshua D., and Jörn-Steffen Pischke. 2009. Mostly Harmless Econometrics: An Empiricist's Companion. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.
7. Beckley, Amber L., Avshalom Caspi, Jonathan Broadbent, Honalee Harrington, Renate M. Houts, Richie G. Poulton, Sandhya Ramrakha, Aaron Reuben, and Terrie E. Moffitt. 2017. The association between childhood blood lead level and criminal offending. JAMA Pediatrics. https://doi.org/10.1001/jamapediatrics.2017.4005
8. Bellinger, David C. 2017. Childhood lead exposure and adult outcomes. JAMA 317:1219–20.
9. Blackwell, Matthew, Stefano Iacus, Gary King, and Giuseppe Porro. 2009. CEM: Coarsened exact matching in Stata. Stata Journal 9:524–46.
10. Boutwell, Brian B., Erik J. Nelson, Brett Emo, Michael G. Vaughn, Mario Schootman, Richard Rosenfeld, and Roger Lewis. 2016. The intersection of aggregate-level lead exposure and crime. Environmental Research 148:79–85.
11. Braun, Joseph M., Robert S. Kahn, Tanya Froehlich, Peggy Auinger, and Bruce P. Lanphear. 2006. Exposures to environmental toxicants and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder in U.S. children. Environmental Health Perspectives 114:1904–9.
12. Braun, Joseph M., Tanya E. Froehlich, Julie L. Daniels, Kim N. Dietrich, Richard Hornung, Pegg Auinger, and Bruce P. Lanphear. 2008. Association of environmental toxicants and conduct disorder in U.S. children: NHANES 2001–2004. Environmental Health Perspectives 116:956–62.
13. Burns, Jane M., Peter A. Baghurst, Michael G. Sawyer, Anthony J. McMichael, and Shilu Tong. 1999. Lifetime low-level exposure to environmental lead and children's emotional and behavioral development at ages 11–13 years: The Port Pirie cohort study. American Journal of Epidemiology 149:740–9.
14. Canfield, Richard L., Charles R. Henderson, Deborah A. Cory-Slechta, Christopher Cox, Todd A. Jusko, and Bruce P. Lanphear. 2003. Intellectual impairment in children with blood lead concentrations below 10 μg per deciliter. New England Journal of Medicine 348:1517–26.
15. Cecil, Kim M., Christopher J. Brubaker, Caleb M. Adler, Kim N. Dietrich, Mekibib Altaye, John C. Egelhoff, Stephanie Wessel, Ilayarja Elangovan, Richard Hornung, Kelly Jarvis, and Bruce P. Lanphear. 2008. Decreased brain volume in adults with childhood lead exposure. PLoS Med 5:741–50.
16. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). 1991. Preventing Lead Poisoning in Young Children. Atlanta, GA.
17. Denno, Deborah W. 1990. Biology and Violence: From Birth to Adulthood. Cambridge, U.K.: Cambridge University Press.
18. Denno, Deborah W. 1992. Considering lead poisoning as a criminal defense. Fordham Urban Law Journal 20:377–400.
19. Devitt, Christine Westley, and Erica Hughes. 2016. Assessing the Quality of Illinois Criminal History Record Information (CHRI) System Data on Juveniles. Chicago, IL: Illinois Criminal Justice Information Authority.
20. Dietrich, Kim, Ris Douglas, Paul Succop, Omer Berger, and Robert Bornschein. 2001. Early exposure to lead and juvenile delinquency. Neurotoxicology and Teratology 23:511–8.
21. Eckel, William, Michael Rabinowitz, and Gregory Foster. 2001. Discovering unrecognized lead smelting sites by historical methods. American Journal of Public Health 91:625–7.
22. Elliott, Delbert S., David Huizinga, and Scott Menard. 1989. Multiple Problem Youth: Delinquency, Substance Use, and Mental Health Problems. New York: Springer-Verlag.
23. Farrington, David P. 1998. Individual differences in offending. In The Handbook of Crime and Punishment, ed. Michael Tonry. New York: Oxford University Press.
24. Farrington, David P. 2017. The need to include biological variables in prospective longitudinal studies of the development of criminal behavior. JAMA Pediatrics. https://doi.org/10.1001/jamapediatrics.2017.4237
25. Farrington, David P., Darrick Jolliffe, Rolf Loeber, Magda Stouthamer-Loeber, and Larry M. Kalb. 2001. The concentration of offenders in families, and family criminality in the prediction of boys' delinquency. Journal of Adolescence 24:579–96.
26. Feigenbaum, James J., and Christopher Muller. 2016. Lead exposure and violent crime in the early twentieth century. Explorations in Economic History 62:51–86.
27. Fergusson, David M., Joseph. M. Boden, and L. John. Horwood. 2008. Dentine lead levels in childhood and criminal behaviour in late adolescence and early adulthood. Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health 62:1045–50.
28. Goodlad, James K., David K. Marcus, and Jessica J. Fulton. 2013. Lead and attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) symptoms: A meta-analysis. Clinical Psychology Review 33:417–25.
29. Goodnough, Abby. 2016a. Flint weighs scope of harm to children caused by lead in water. New York Times. January 30, A1.
30. Goodnough, Abby. 2016b. Their soil toxic, 1,100 Indiana residents scramble to find new homes. New York Times. August 30, A1.
31. Gottfredson, Michael R., and Travis Hirschi. 1990. A General Theory of Crime. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press.
32. Hanna-Attisha, Mona, Jenny LaChance, Richard Casey Sadler, and Allison Champney Schnepp. 2016. Elevated blood lead levels in children associated with the Flint drinking water crisis: A spatial analysis of risk and public health response. American Journal of Public Health 106:283–90.
33. Heckman, James J., John Eric Humphries, and Tim Kautz (eds.). 2014. The Myth of Achievement Tests: The GED and the Role of Character in American Life. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.
34. Iacus, Stefano M., Gary King, and Giuseppe Porro. 2012. Causal inference without balance checking: Coarsened exact matching. Political Analysis 20:1–24.
35. Jacobs, David E., Robert P. Clickner, Joey Y. Zhou, Susan M. Viet, David A. Marker, John W. Rogers, Darryl C. Zeldin, Pamela Broene, and Warren Friedman. 2002. The prevalence of lead-based paint hazards in U.S. housing. Environmental Health Perspectives 110:A599–606.
36. Jones, Robert L., David M. Homa, Pamela A. Meyer, Debra J. Brody, Kathleen L. Caldwell, James L. Pirkle, and Mary Jean Brown. 2009. Trends in blood lead levels and blood lead testing among U.S. children aged 1 to 5 years, 1988–2004. Pediatrics 123:e376–85.
37. Judd, Charles M., and David A. Kenny. 1981. Estimating the Effects of Social Interventions. New York: Cambridge University Press.
38. Landrigan, Philip J., Stephen H. Gehlbach, Bernard F. Rosenblum, Jimmie M. Shoults, Robert M. Candelaria, William F. Barthel, John A. Liddle, Ann L. Smrek, Norman W. Staehling, and JoDean F. Sanders. 1975. Epidemic lead absorption near an ore smelter: The role of particulate lead. The New England Journal of Medicine 292:123–9.
39. Lanphear, Bruce P., Robert S. Byrd, Peggy Auinger, and Stanley J. Schaffer. 1998. Community characteristics associated with elevated blood lead levels in children. Pediatrics 101:264–71.
40. Lanphear, Bruce P., Kim Dietrich, Peggy Auinger, and Cox. Christopher. 2000. Cognitive deficits associated with blood lead concentrations <10 microg/dl in U.S. children and adolescents. Public Health Reports 115:521–9.
41. Lanphear, Bruce P., Richard Hornung, Mona Ho, Cynthia R. Howard, Shirley Eberly, and Karen Knauf. 2002. Environmental lead exposure during early childhood. The Journal of Pediatrics 140:40–7.
42. Lanphear, Bruce P., Richard Hornung, Jane Khoury, Kimberly Yolton, Peter Baghurst, David C. Bellinger, Richard L. Canfield, Kim N. Dietrich, Robert Bornschein, Tom Greene, Stephen J. Rothenberg, Herbert L. Needleman, Lourdes Schnaas, Gail Wasserman, Joseph Graziano, and Russell Roberts. 2005. Low-level environmental lead exposure and children's intellectual function: An international pooled analysis. Environmental Health Perspectives 113:894–9.
43. Lanphear, Bruce P., and Klaus J. Roghmann. 1997. Pathways of lead exposure in urban children. Environmental Research 74:67–73.
44. Lauritsen, Janet L., Maribeth L. Rezey, and Karen Heimer. 2016. When choice of data matters: Analyses of US crime trends, 1973–2012. Journal of Quantitative Criminology 32:335–55.
45. Lidsky, Theodore I., and Jay S. Schneider. 2003. Lead neurotoxicity in children: Basic mechanisms and clinical correlates. Brain 126:5–19.
46. Lipton, Eric. 2017. Why has the E.P.A. shifted on toxic chemicals? An industry insider helps call the shots. New York Times. October 21.
47. Lynch, Michael J., Paul B. Stretesky, and Michael A. Long. 2015. Environmental justice: A criminological perspective. Environmental Research Letters 10:1–6.
48. Lytton, Hugh. 1990. Child and parent effects in boys’ conduct disorder: A reinterpretation. Developmental Psychology 26:683–97.
49. Marcus, David K., Jessica J. Fulton, and Erin J. Clarke. 2010. Lead and conduct problems: A meta-analysis. Journal of Clinical Child & Adolescent Psychology 39:234–41.
50. Markowitz, Gerald, and David Rosner. 2013. Lead Wars: The Politics of Science and the Fate of America's Children. Berkeley: University of California Press.
51. McCall, Patricia L., and Kenneth C Land. 2004. Trends in environmental lead exposure and troubled youth, 1960–1995: An age-period-cohort characteristic analysis. Social Science Research 33:339–59.
52. McCoy, Terrence. 2017. Washington's worst case of lead poisoning in decades happened in a home sanctioned by housing officials. Washington Post. January 30.
53. Mielke, Howard W., and Sammy Zahran. 2012. The urban rise and fall of air lead (pb) and the latent surge and retreat of societal violence. Environment International 43:48–55.
54. Moffitt, Terri E. 1990. Neuropsychology of juvenile delinquency: A critical review. In Crime and Justice: A Review of Research, vol. 12, ed. Michael Tonry. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.
55. Moffitt, Terrie E. 1993. Adolescence-limited and life-course-persistent antisocial behavior: A developmental taxonomy. Psychological Review 100:674–701.
56. Muller, Christopher, Robert J. Sampson, and Alix Winter. 2018. Environmental inequality: The social causes and consequences of lead exposure. Annual Review of Sociology 44. Epub ahead of print. https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-soc-073117-041222.
57. Muller, Christopher, Christopher Winship, and Stephen L. Morgan. 2014. Instrumental variables regression. In Sage Handbook of Regression Analysis and Causal Inference, eds. Henning Best and Christof Wolf. London, U.K.: Sage.
58. Murnane, Richard J., and John B. Willett. 2010. Introducing instrumental-variables estimation. In Methods Matter: Improving Causal Inference in Educational and Social Science Research. New York: Oxford University Press.
59. Narag, Raymund E., Jesenia Pizarro, and Carole Gibbs. 2009. Lead exposure and its implications for criminologial theory. Criminal Justice and Behavior 36:954–73.
60. National Research Council. 1993. Measuring Lead Exposure in Infants, Children and Other Sensitive Populations. Washington, DC: National Academy of Sciences.
61. Needleman, Herbert. 2004. Lead poisoning. Annual Review of Medicine 55:209–22.
62. Needleman, Herbert L., Christine McFarland, Roberta B. Ness, Stephen E. Fienberg, and Michael J. Tobin. 2002. Bone lead levels in adjudicated delinquents: A case control study. Neurotoxicology and Teratology 24:711–7.
63. Needleman, Herbert I., Julie A. Riess, Michael J. Tobin, Gretchen E. Biesecker, and Joel B. Greenhouse. 1996. Bone lead levels and delinquent behavior. Journal of American Medical Association 275:363–9.
64. Nevin, Rick. 2000. How lead exposure relates to temporal changes in IQ, violent crime, and unwed pregnancy. Environmental Research 83:1–22.
65. Nevin, Rick. 2007. Understanding international crime trends: The legacy of preschool lead exposure. Environmental Research 104:315–36.
66. Nguyen, Holly, and Thomas Loughran. 2018. On the measurement and identification of turning points in criminology. Annual Review of Criminology 1:335–58.
67. Nunn, Nathan, and Leonard Wantchekon. 2011. The slave trade and the origins of mistrust in Africa. American Economic Review 101:3221–52.
68. Olympio, Kelly P. K., Pedro V. Oliveira, Juliana Naozuka, Maria R. A. Cardoso, Antonio F. Marques, Wanda M. R. Günther, and Etelvino J. H. Bechara. 2010. Surface dental enamel lead levels and antisocial behavior in brazilian adolescents. Neurotoxicology and Teratology 32:273–79.
69. Oyana, Tonny J., and Florence M. Margai. 2010. Spatial patterns and health disparities in pediatric lead exposure in Chicago: Characteristics and profiles of high-risk neighborhoods. The Professional Geographer 62:46–65.
70. Pell, M. B., and Joshua Schneyer. 2016. Off the charts: The thousands of U.S. locales where lead poisoning is worse than in Flint. Reuters. December 19. http://www.reuters.com/investigates/special-report/usa-leadtesting/.
71. Pihl, Robert O., and F. Ervin. 1990. Lead and cadmium levels in violent criminals. Psychological Reports 66:839–44.
72. Rabinowitz, Michael, Alan Leviton, and David Bellinger. 1985. Home refinishing, lead paint, and infant blood lead levels. American Journal of Public Health 75:403–4.
73. Reuben, Aaron, Avshalom Caspi, Daniel W. Belsky, Jonathan Broadbent, Honalee Harrington, Karen Sugden, Renate M. Houts, Sandhya Ramrakha, Richie Poulton, and Terrie E. Moffitt. 2017. Association of childhood blood lead levels with cognitive function and socioeconomic status at age 38 years and with IQ change and socioeconomic mobility between childhood and adulthood. JAMA 317:1244–51.
74. Reyes, Jessica Wolpaw. 2007. Environmental policy as social policy? The impact of childhood lead exposure on crime. The B.E. Journal of Economic Analysis & Policy 7:1–41.
75. Reyes, Jessica Wolpaw. 2015. Lead exposure and behavior: Effects on antisocial and risky behavior among children and adolescents. Economic Inquiry 53:1580–605.
76. Sampson, Robert J. 2012. Great American City: Chicago and the Enduring Neighborhood Effect. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.
77. Sampson, Robert J. 2016. The characterological imperative: On Heckman, Humphries, and Kautz's The Myth of Achievement Tests: The GED and the Role of Character in American Life. Journal of Economic Literature 54:493–513.
78. Sampson, Robert J., and John H. Laub. 1993. Crime in the Making: Pathways and Turning Points Through Life. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
79. Sampson, Robert J., and Alix Winter. 2016. The racial ecology of lead poisoning: Toxic inequality in Chicago neighborhoods, 1995–2013. Du Bois Review: Social Science Research on Race 13:261–83.
80. Sharkey, Patrick T. 2013. Stuck in Place: Urban Neighborhoods and the End of Progress Toward Racial Equality. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.
81. Staiger, Douglas, and James H. Stock. 1997. Instrumental variables regression with weak instruments. Econometrica 65:557–86.
82. Stock, James H., and Motohiro T. Yogo. 2005. Testing for weak instruments in linear IV regression. In Identification and Inference for Econometric Models, eds. Donald W. K. Andrews and James H. Stock. New York: Cambridge University Press.
83. Stretesky, Paul B., and Michael J. Lynch. 2001. The relationship between lead exposure and homicide. Archives Pediatric Adolescent Medicine 155:579–82.
84. Stretesky, Paul B., and Michael J. Lynch. 2004. The relationship between lead and crime. Journal of Health and Social Behavior 45:214–29.
85. Taylor, Mark Patrick, Miriam K. Forbes, Brian Opeskin, Nick Parr, and Bruce P. Lanphear. 2016. The relationship between atmospheric lead emissions and aggressive crime: An ecological study. Environmental Health 15:1–10.
86. Thomson, G. O. B., G. M. Raab, W. S. Hepburn, R. Hunter, M. Fulton, and D. P. H. Laxen. 1989. Blood-lead levels and children's behaviour—Results from the Edinburgh lead study. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry 30:515–28.
87. Tong, Shilu, Yasmin E. von Schirnding, and Tippawan Prapamontol. 2000. Environmental lead exposure: A public health problem of global dimensions. Bulletin of the World Health Organization 78:1068–77.
88. Travis, Jeremy, Bruce Western, and Steve Redburn (eds.). 2014. The Growth of Incarceration in the United States: Exploring Causes and Consequences. Washington, DC: National Academies Press.
89. Troesken, Werner. 2006. The Great Lead Water Pipe Disaster. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
90. Vargas, G., G. García, M. Rubio Andrade, L. M. Del Razo, V. Borja Aburto, E. Vera Aguilar, and M. E. Cebrián. 2001. Lead exposure in children living in a smelter community in region Lagunera, Mexico. Journal of Toxicology and Environmental Health, Part A 62:417–29.
91. West, Donald, and David P. Farrington. 1977. The Delinquent Way of Life. London, U.K.: Heinemann.
92. Winter, Alix S., and Robert J. Sampson. 2017. From lead exposure in early childhood to adolescent health: A Chicago birth cohort. American Journal of Public Health 107:1496–501.
93. Wright, John P., Kim Dietrich, Douglas Ris, Richard Hornung, Stephanie Wessel, Bruce P. Lanphear, Mona Ho, and Mary Rae. 2008. Association of prenatal and childhood blood lead concentrations with criminal arrests in early adulthood. PLoS Med 5:e101.
94. Ziegler, Ekhard, Barbara Edwards, Robert Jense, Kathryn Mahaffey, and Samuel Fomon. 1978. Absorption and retention of lead by infants. Pediatric Research 12:29–34.